Standing at the edge looking in...

Today I took my sons to the neighborhood park. It's a nice little park with good equipment and I'm glad that it was built. However, I would much prefer little bits of woods left there. I would prefer a place where my sons can go and feel a part of nature-- if only a little bit. Instead, there is a small wooded patch next to the park that is owned by someone. So the city has dutifully put up a fence to clearly mark the border of where the kids should and shouldn't go. I resent it to my very core and I especially resented it today because I had to administer a spanking to my younger son because he finds the forest much more compelling than the play equipment. But it is somebody else's property and I told him he could not go there. My son, being who he is, decided to go there anyway. I went over the fence and dutifully removed him. I also told him he'd get a spanking if he went there again. And my son, being who he is and still wanting to go, headed right back to the woods, smiling with both hands over his fanny, and climbed through the fence. As promised, I crawled in after him and gave him the promised swat. Tears. Whining, the usual. And I felt terrible.
I did not feel terrible for the spanking, but I did feel terrible for having to tell him not to go in the first place. I feel sad that there are so few places for children just to go and explore. I guess there really weren’t that many places when I was growing up, but they could be found. Now even these sacred places have been made into neighborhoods and most remaining green spaces have fences around them. Now it is almost impossible to find unimproved spaces to play. Some parks have left forest for exploring, but even these have nice little paths running through them that scream, “don’t dare cross into the woods lest something terrible befall you.” So even then, it is limited and not without guilt for exploring too far. I cry for today’s children and their children who will most probably be even more cut off. There is a book called Last Child in the Woods, by Richard Louv, which addresses this topic. It brings together a new and growing body of research indicating that direct exposure to nature is essential for healthy childhood development and for the physical and emotional health of children and adults (taken from the overview). I have skimmed it and found that it called to me and made many points that ring true for my children and myself. I’m going to get the new edition and read it cover to cover because it broke my heart to see my son standing at the edge of the woods and crying to go in. He is always asking to go to the forest and I want to make a point to get him and the rest of the family there more often. As a child, my encounters in the woods really did have a way of teaching me, entertaining me, and soothing my soul. I want that for my sons, my husband, and myself. Over the years, I have felt the deepest parts of me cry out for more contact with the trees, but the life that I lead does not take me there. It will require more effort, but in the long run, it will have its own rewards. Soon our family will be heading to the Shenandoah valley for a time of respite and fun and we all look forward to taking full advantage of it!